After the tragedy of the last book, I found myself struggling with this book. There was only ONE good character, Nikolai, and he didn't even get to do a lot.

I'm just so amazed that this book, this series, has such incredible world-building and magic, but I can't put into words how much I hate the main characters. Mal and Alina are probably some of the worst characters I've ever read. Mal is an abusive jerk who doesn't deserve any form of love or admiration. He is manipulative and desperately needs a therapist for his insecurities. Then Alina also needs a therapist because the poor girl was completely manipulated by Mal and was willing to do anything for his happiness instead of her own. She deserved happiness, and she never got it. She only got happiness because Mal was happy, and I'm not OK with that.

The only other interesting character was Baghra. Her story was so interesting and so short, so it didn't intrigue me for that long.

This series was just OK. I'm going to be forever flabbergasted that such a beautiful world is full of terribly written characters. It's almost a slap in the face to the world. This world doesn't deserve this treatment at all.

That being said, I'm going to read the other books because the show was very good and made me interested, but I'd be happy if I never have to deal with Alina and Mal, especially Mal, ever again.